Polar Defense Project Deletes The Tough Questions « Watts Up With That?

Thus, it would seem that the Polar Defense Project won’t answer the tough questions, or even allow comments about them. The lack of basic planning and the inflated claims on this project are stunning, the lack of tolerance for anything that questions the project is also telling.

Sadly it appears that the expedition was nothing more than a poorly executed publicity stunt.

Chris Niskanen: Weather blamed for fewer pheasants - TwinCities.com

The Department of Natural Resources' pheasant report Tuesday is a stark reminder that ringnecks live on the razor's edge here in Minnesota.

The state's pheasant index is down 24 percent from last year's peak, when hunters killed 655,000 roosters, the most since 1964. Foul weather this spring gets much of the blame, when rain and cold weather washed away pheasant nests or chicks died of hypothermia. Hunters had hoped for better news.

Minnesota has been riding a wave of seven mild winters, and pheasant numbers have correspondingly shot up. This past winter also was moderate to mild, but things turned nasty in April with four significant snowfalls in pheasant country, followed by cold weather up through the peak of the hatch in early June.
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Iowa has suffered significant losses in acreage enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program. Then it was walloped by one of the most severe winters in memory. (Remember all those snowstorms that swept south of Minnesota last winter?) Iowa's pheasant index fell 32 percent this year, and it is possible Minnesota will harvest as many roosters as Iowa does this year.
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With corn-based ethanol, high land and crop prices threatening to pull more grasslands out of conservation programs, Minnesota's grassland habitat — and its pheasant population — faces a grim future. It is one reason why sports groups are urging passage this fall of a constitutional amendment earmarking three-eighths of 1 percent for natural resources, clean waters, parks and trails, and arts projects.